Alina

Like ants to sugar or bees to flowers the little dove was drawn to warmth. Her thin skin made her unfit for cold weather and because of this she had been on the move most of her life to find a place warm enough for her to feel comfortable. Her birthplace had been a desert landscape bordering to a humid rainforest, but she wouldn’t return there. Not even if she was granted all the magic of the world. But now she needed not to worry her head with thoughts of her old homeland, now she had found a new home and better yet; a new desert! But when one has been on sort of a run for most of one’s life it could be quite hard to stay put and so the little dove had decided to explore her new home - all of it.

She had started with the Dragon’s Throat; her new herdland and in due time she expected to know every little corner of Helovia. And when she felt that these lands couldn’t give her anything more, well then she would simply move on, for such was her mind; never resting, always looking to experience new things.

Maybe it was her love of warmth that drove her north from the desert oasis, maybe it was the memory of that reddish gleam she’d detected on her way down to the Dragon’s Throat or maybe it was just by chance that she ended up at Helovia’s heart. But where else would be a better start of her exploration than the very center of the land?

Her downy, white wings bore her somewhat unsteadily over a vast sea of tall grass as her emerald eyes focused on the glow in the distance. The air was very still and she was growing weary from beating her wings in order to keep her body at the altitude she desired. But the strain was not showing in her smiling face. To keep her already high spirit up the dove allowed her body to drift closer to the grass below. The grayish green stalks tickled her pasterns and cannons and she began to giggle - a childish bell-like sound that seemed to have no place in these ashy, barren lands.

The sky above her was dark and the sun, which would be at its highest point by now, was obscured by grey clouds, or was it ash? The air was heavy and smelled like sulfur; the dove would even go so far as to say it tasted like sulfur. But she was used to scorn ground, ash and the smell of fire. Back in the land where she was born red flames consumed the vegetation every year to leave the soil prepared for next generation of desert bushes and weeds. And so she felt quite relaxed in this part of her new homeland.

The grass gave way to a plain of cracked clay and the dove decided to let her wings rest and use her skinny legs for a while. She glided closer to the ground, slowly retracting her wings to her body. For a while she soared parallel to the brown floor and then she landed in a smooth gallop. She kept the same pace for a few yards and then she slowed to a comfortable jog. It was easy to move over the hard clay - not as tiring as it was to run through soft sand and she very much enjoyed herself and the surroundings. Her ever-present smile broadened when she noticed that the air was getting hotter and the fact that her pristine white body had turned grey from the dust and sweat did not concern the little dove at all. But she wondered if she was alone out here, surely there must be other travelers about?

bg and flower: locolobo.net